Ask the Expert about EMC VSPEX: Building your Private Cloud so that you can focus on your business

This discussion is now open for questions. Now its actually a Public holiday in Germany, on Monday, 9th June,  so John and Christian will likely not get to answer your questions until tomorrow. With that said we are really looking forward to a lively and interactive discussion about building out your private cloud.

Best regards,

Mark

Hello Customers, Partners, and Colleagues,

Welcome to the first "Ask The Expert" Campaign (focusing on VSPEX) to take place in EMEA!

Over the past two years VSPEX has stirred much interest in our Partner community and caused a wave of excitement, activities, and has established itself as a cornerstone of many customers' Private Clouds and End-User-Computing (VDI) environments.

Within one and a half years VSPEX has become one of  the leading converged infrastructure / Reference Architecture based solutions for data centers.

We are gearing up to make VSPEX even more relevant by using it as the cornerstone to diverse Hybrid Solutions in which our diverse Cloud Service Provider partners play a large role in helping to make our VAR's and Distribution partners even more relevent in meeting today's needs.

Through the support of our colleagues, Suhela Dighe and Mark Browne, (Thank you both!) this site has been set up where we can ask questions, exchange viewpoints,  answer questions, and review answers of the experts and any one who wants to collaborate.

So, ask away!!

Christian Stein, myself, and others are keen to read your questions and to assist you.

Regards

John

Hi John,

Can you help me understand  what the difference between VCE and VSPEX? Its a question that comes up often from the partner community and it would be great to hear your views.

Many Thanks

Sue

Hi Sue,

Great question which we always get - in most cases treating VSPEX as a VCE/vBlock competition, which is definitely not the case. We see VSPEX as a supplementary offer for partners forming a Reference Architecture based Converged Infrastructure.

While vBlock is built by VCE using predefined SW for Hypervisor (VMware) and line-cards for compute (Cisco), network (Cisco) and EMC of course as storage, VSPEX is more flexible in tailoring the solution to the partner portfolio and customer needs following the VSPEX RA's which are more generic especially for the compute and network components, and offer choice for the Hypervisor stack and management as well.

So we see from different partners VSPEX solutions containing different server and network brands although Cisco is providing us with VSPEX validated designs (CVD's) for Cisco's UCS server and Nexus switches.

And EMC is helping partners to size a very flexible non-siloed PC/HC stack using the VSPEX Sizing Tool.

Additionally VSPEX can be used for leading the customer to a Private/Hybrid Cloud solution by including existing customer resources to the solution, e.g. customers server and NW resources could be easily included to the VSPEX stack following the resource demands as defined by the VSPEX RA's.

And VSPEX is a partner only program, so any partner can offer his VSPEX solution including his services and support.

In terms of support EMC is offering now a single support line for VSPEX for partners as well as for end-customers operating a VSPEX solution.

Last but not least VSPEX offers a rich eco-system of partner solutions, validated by EMC in the VSPEX lab. So for end-to-end management, VSPEX infrastructure and application extenders you will find a rich choice of solutions for VSPEX.

So under the line, there are many possibilities where a pre-built CI solution like VCE vBlock is a perfect fit - especially for green field installations. But not all customers are ready for this or want more choice. Not having a complementary and flexible additional offer our partners simply could not realise all customer projects and requests.

Hi John and Christian,

Can you explain, if a VSPEX comes all assembled or, who needs to do that?

Thanks!

Hello Suhela,

We have designed VSPEX solutions to be built by our partners, namely our Reselling and Distribution partners.

Once the partner has sized and selected the "right" VSPEX solution they use EMC's detailed Reference Architectures which assists them in the "Build" of the solution.

The actually "Build" takes place (in most cases) at the customer's site.

VSPEX offers much flexibility in the choice of which server or switch vendor may be integrated and offers the possible to use or re-purpose assets which are already exist in the customer's data center.

If the customer prefers to have a turnkey solution delivered (pre-built) then partners may also do this.

In fact EMC recognize Distribution Partners with an accreditation named "EMC Assembly Services". Such Distribution partners combine this accreditation along with their assembly facilities to provide their Partners with a pre-built VSPEX and a simplified invoicing or what we often refer to as a "SKU" (Stock Keeping Unit) which is appreciated by the partner (esp. their back-office and accountants) making the procurement of the solution easy.

Regards

John

John Lavallée

Partner Solutions Lead EMEA

EMC | Global Services Partners

Hi Suhela,

Just adding to what John was perfectly saying, it is part of the VSPEX Partner Enablement process finding out what the partner can do with VSPEX especially in terms of assembling services and co-branding. We are providing partners the possibility to put his name on the special VSPEX console (fits on EMC's titan rack and the Panduit rack) in case the partner has the possibility for rack and stack - or involving EMC ECO-system partner like Panduit which is offering a complete service for doing this world-wide.

So in fact we have a broad spectrum of partners doing different things with VSPEX, partners which are offering already a complete set of VSPEX RA based Converged Infrastructure solutions in different sizings with own rack design approved by EMC and other partners which potentially can use their assembly lines for rack and stack and are planing this as soon as they have VSPEX SKUs defined and advertised.

On the other hand as VSPEX is flexible in terms of what the end-customer can re-use of existing infrastructure building finally a RA based CI, so we see in many cases what John was describing, building the solution at the customer site, using partner services and existing customer HW resources for this.    

Hope this makes sense,

Regards, Christian

Hi John / Christian,

1 .Can we manage servers, VM's and storage with single management tool in VSPEX? if yes is it free or licensed ?

Thank you,

Gopi

Hello Gopi,

I've got good news for you!

We can manage servers, VM's, and storage with a single management tool in VSPEX.

This kind of complete or converged management offering is available with diverse solutions (these comprehensive solutions are indeed licensed).

They are:

• EMC UIM (Unified Infrastructure Management)

http://www.emc.com/collateral/data-sheet/h11948-uim-vspex-ds.pdf

• Cisco UCS Director (formerly known as Cloupia)

http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/servers-unified-computing/ucs-director/index.html

• fluid Operations eCloud Manager

http://www.fluidops.com/solutions/private-cloud-enablement-on-emc-vspex-with-ecloudmanager/

Note: fluidOps is an EMC partner and their solution can be sold via EMC Brokering or engaging directly with fluidOps.

If you are looking for solutions which are "free of charge" then you can consider using the free plug-ins which EMC have created:

For VMware vCenter:

• VSI / EMC Virtual Storage Integrator plug-in

http://www.emc.com/cloud-virtualization/virtual-storage-integrator.htm

Here EMC offer an integrated point of control to simplify VMware storage management – all within vCenter (the plug-in adds an EMC tab)

For Microsoft System Center

• ESI / EMC Storage Integrator

http://www.emc.com/data-center-management/storage-integrator-for-windows-suite.htm

Here the integration is in Microsoft's System Center and allows an admin to manage the storage infrastructure from the tool-set used to manage a Microsoft virtual environment.

Regards

John

John Lavallée

Partner Solutions Lead EMEA

EMC | Global Services Partners

Mobile: +49-163-6895020